Craig James fired for being an anti-gay bigot, not for being a Christian.

Former ESPN commentator Craig James was fired after one week with FOX Sports. He claims it was because he is religious:

“I was shocked that my personal religious beliefs were not only the reason for Fox Sports firing me but I was completely floored when I read stories quoting Fox Sports representatives essentially saying that people of faith are banned from working at FOX Sports,” James told Breitbart.com. “That is not right and surely someone made a terrible mistake.”

James, who left his job calling college football at ESPN to run for the United States Senate in his home state of Texas, has failed in his attempt to return to broadcasting because of anti-gay comments he made during that Senate campaign.

During his campaign, James criticized another candidate for attending a gay pride parade, promised he would never do such a thing, and said that being gay is a choice and that gay people “are going to have to answer to the Lord for their actions.” ESPN confirmed shortly after James made those comments that James (who finished a distant fourth with 4 percent of the vote in the Republican primary) would not be welcome back at the network.

At the start of this college football season, FOX Sports Southwest announced that James would be one of its college football commentators. But a week later, James was out. And now FOX has confirmed that those anti-gay comments are the reason.

Many religious people seem to think that their faith is some sort of cocktail that, when applied to odious beliefs, makes them a-ok. Well it’s not. If you believe hateful, insidious things because of your religion, it makes them no less hateful and insidious.

If your religion made you a racist, guess what: you don’t get to keep working there either. It’s not that FOX Sports is opposed to religion, it’s opposed to discrimination. What if FOX Sports has gay people working there (as they surely do)? They can’t have bigots in positions of power, and they can’t be hiring people who denigrate their own employees – and it’s not your religious right to have them make an exception for you.